Martin Bashir

[cromwell]

Wow.
Just seen Prince William's statement about the Bashir interview on the TV.
He was obviously angry but measured; far more so than many would have been, given the circumstances.
The BBC have done themselves no favours and their protestations of regret ring pretty hollow when you consider that Bashir was allowed to retire on ill health just days before the report came out. Protecting their boy until the end.

[saundra]

I remember watching that interview
And feeling so sad for her
Corruption was not a word we had heard of them like it is now
And Martin Bashir was a respectable interview er
He now has to face his own demons

[Workingman]

Journalist, even a BBC one, uses dirty tricks to secure a blockbuster scoop interview!
Well that's never happened before.
Employer defends or whitewashes actions of said journalist in internal inquiry.
Nope, never happened before.
Are millions of us outside the journalistic bubble needing counselling or losing sleep over it all some 25+ years down the line?
I suspect not.

Journalists, politicians and estate agents are all at the foot of the public's trust ladder, for obvious reasons.

[TheOstrich]

He now has to face his own demons

I would prefer it if he had to face the law courts, Saundra, for profiteering by deception. But I doubt it will happen somehow. Similarly I'd like to see Ofcom take some sort of punitive action but I won't hold my breath.

As for the BBC, they are arrogant and need taking down by more than a peg or two. A good start, in my book, would be to cap the licence fee at £75 for the next 10 years, it's in the Government's remit to do so. I don't see why we, the public, should be forced to pour more and more funds into such a biased organisation.

I do feel sorry for Prince William. This BBC bombshell on the one hand and his bleating brother on the other ......

[Suff]

Personally I'm partially with WM but I'm also with Ossie.

I'd want to see the rules, regulations and punishments to be put in place to ensure this does not happen again.

Also the quality checks and controls put in place to make sure it either does not happen or is highlighted at the earliest possible moment so it can be stopped.

If they won't do that, then they can go private and we can scrap the TV license. End of story. Let the government sell them off and make some money out of the millstone. Then they can become accountable to the money and we can understand that their biased viewpoint is based on whoever has the largest stake.

The BBC has been digging its own grave for decades. If they won't reform, time put put them in it and cover it over.

[saundra]

I have to re start paying for a tv licence this year

[Workingman]

Alternatively, if it had not been on the BBC.... Diana wanted her story to be told and months before the Bashir interview or contact with him she had approached Max Hastings of the Telegraph, but he refused to run it because she appeared vulnerable and impressionable.

Was what Diana said in the interview in any way approaching the truth? I didn't see it but could not escape the aftermath. I do remember her friends and those in her inner circle suggesting that a lot of it was true and circling the wagons in defence. The public, by and large, also bought in. It was 'The Diana Show' and she was going to tell it her way.

It is not only the BBC that needs its wings clipping, try the whole media. As far as news is concerned things went downhill with the 24hr versions. Where we once had five updated bulletins we now have rolling 'updates' where it could be as little as a change of punctuation or one word. And we now also get conjecture, opinion and endless discussions where once we had facts.

[Suff]

It is not only the BBC that needs its wings clipping, try the whole media. As far as news is concerned things went downhill with the 24hr versions. Where we once had five updated bulletins we now have rolling 'updates' where it could be as little as a change of punctuation or one word. And we now also get conjecture, opinion and endless discussions where once we had facts.

+1

[cromwell]

He now has to face his own demons

I would prefer it if he had to face the law courts, Saundra, for profiteering by deception. But I doubt it will happen somehow. Similarly I'd like to see Ofcom take some sort of punitive action but I won't hold my breath.

As for the BBC, they are arrogant and need taking down by more than a peg or two.

I fully agree. The BBC reporter Nick Robinson referred to "the two great institutions, the monarchy and the BBC". The BBC's opinion of itself is staggeringly arrogant.

As for these BBC reforms? It doesn't matter what structure you have so much as the type of people you employ and their mindset; and I can't see either changing.
BBC news has moved to Salford but it hasn't changed the BBC in any way that I can see.

[Workingman]

I thought that national, international and 24hr news moved to a new place in London. It was only the peripheral stuff - Radio Five Live, Cbeebies, BBC Sport, religion and so on that moved to Media City to make it look like the BBC was moving out of London.

I do agree, though, that the structure, culture and mindset has not changed one iota. I see that Hall has now resigned from the National Gallery as it is a "distraction". It would have been better if he had resigned (been sacked) from the BBC, along with a few others.